New York State's park strikes an extraordinary balance between modern interests and the forest primeval.

Photograph by Michael Melford

Leaves of maple and birch make an art of dying on the dark surface of Lake Placid. With thousands of lakes and ponds, the park is a favorite of paddlers and the center of a century-old and still thriving boatbuilding tradition.

Sunlight dapples the shoulders of Algonquin and Wright, two of the more than 40 so-called High Peaks that rise above 4,000 feet. Once blighted by logging and industry, the region has undergone a renaissance of woods and waters.

With its tenacious trees and rebounding wildlife, Adirondack Park is a miracle of regeneration. On the trail to Goodnow Mountain, a yellow birch appears to be ingesting a boulder left behind by a glacier.

An underwater camera offers a fish's-eye view of lily pads on Eagle Lake. Sulfur dioxide from power plants made many Adirondack lakes so acidic they became fishless. Thanks to the Clean Air Act and other measures, some now show signs of recovery.

Winter whitens Mount Van Hoevenberg, its 2,940-foot summit clad in balsam fir and spruce. Taller peaks that reach into the alpine zone are crowned with stunted evergreens called krummholz, from the German, "crooked wood."

The seasons have subtle edges in the Adirondacks. Spring blurs into summer, and winter almost always comes before autumn is really done. Near Chapel Pond the first snow falls before the maples have dropped their leaves.